Victorious Revolution

Written:Written in May-June 19O5Published:First published in 1926 inLenin Miscellany V.

      Published according to the manuscript.Source:Lenin
	  Collected Works,

      Foreign Languages Publishing House,1962,

      Moscow,Volume 8,

      pages450-451.Translated:Bernard Isaacs and The Late Isidor LaskerTranscription\Markup:R. CymbalaPublic Domain:Lenin Internet Archive

      (2003).You may freely copy, distribute,
	display and perform this work; as well as make derivative and
	commercial works. Please credit “Marxists Internet
	Archive” as your source.•README

Weoften hear and read these words nowadays. What. do they actually mean? We
should not idolise the concept of “revolution” (the bourgeois
revolutionaries will assuredly do that and are indeed doing that). We must not
create illusions or myths for ourselves; this would be entirely incompatible
with the materialist conception of history and the class point of view.

Yetthere is no question that a struggle of two forces is taking place before
our eyes, a life-and-death struggle of precisely two forces; for the issue at
stake now is the sovereignty of the tsar versus the sovereignty of the
people. These two forces are: revolution and counter-revolution.

Ourtask, therefore, is to be quite clear in our minds as to (1) the class
content of these social forces, and (2) the real economic content of their
struggle now, at the present time.

Thefollowing may be taken as a brief answer to these questions (an answer that
requires to be thoroughly elaborated):

Revolutionaryforces==proletariat and peasantry (the peasantry as the chief
representative of therevolutionarypetty bourgeoisie; the
intelligentsia negligible as arevolutionaryfactor).

Victoriousrevolution==democratic dictatorship of the proletariat and the
peasantry.

Contentof the revolution==the creation of a democratic political system,
economically equivalent to (1) free development of capitalism; (2) abolition of
the survivals of serfdom; (3) the raising of the living and cultural standards
of the masses, especially of the lower strata. [America and Russia, pauperism
and capitalism.]

Mythenbildung,[1]as the inevitable consequence of the historical
    position of the bourgeois democrats! [Cf. the lawyers’
    resolutions.[4]]

All
    are “socialists”....

Umwälzung,[2]Umsturz[3]... Where? Among the intelligentsia? Among the lawyers?Nil.Only among the proletariat and thep e a s a n t r y.What can guarantee their

con quests?Only the republic, the democratic dictatorship.

[1]Myth-making.—Ed.

[2]Revolution, upheaval.—Ed.

[3]Overthrow.—Ed.

[4]The reference is to the resolutions of the All-Russian
Lawyers’ Congress held in St. Petersburg on March 28-30 (April 10-12),
1905. These resolutions are criticised in the leading article ofProletary, No. 2, June 3 (May 21), 1905.